With their visits finished, Ebony stayed still in the Altarbound’s city studying his toy cube of mass. Out in the open, it was a pure black cube with shiny purple glints flickering. Despite it only being an Uncommon rarity, the puzzle of its gravitational movements had not been uncovered by him yet.
It also changed the way it absorbed light. Either it was pure darkness underground thanks to the lack of a light source or this cube changed the way it reacted to light when it was exposed. It darkened the area around the cube so light was being absorbed but not much and it appeared to be an active usage of the cube’s energy because its current mass shouldn’t be that high. Maybe the weight of a mountain or two.
The cube didn’t increase in size often, it would absorb as much as the same rarity cubes till it saturates before increasing in size. It required 8 saturated Inferior cubes before they decided to combine and become a Common cube. Before that, they wouldn’t combined with more fresh cubes no matter how many Ebony dragged towards them or touched them together.
For the Common cube, he had to prepare 27 of the fully saturated cubes before they combined into a Uncommon Cube.
‘They upgrade in rarity in cubes, 1x1x1, 2x2x2, 3x3x3. Assuming the pattern continues I need 64 fully saturated Uncommon cubes to combine into a Rare cube. If the cube underground is Ancient quality like most of the highest rarity materials here, it took 216 fully saturated Epic cubes to combine and I have no idea how saturated it currently is…’ The material fascinated Ebony quite a bit.
Knowing that fully saturated cubes do not absorb any more, it told him that the singular cube underground wasn’t fully saturated. Either it was the only cube underground, or there were other fully saturated cubes of the same rarity in the surroundings that did not interfere with the new cube’s growth until they had enough fully saturated cubes in range to combine.
If that were the case, there could be anywhere from 0 to 342 fully saturated Ancient ranked cubes underground that hadn’t been unearthed.
‘Unless that cube is even higher in rarity. After Ancient is Legendary if I’m not wrong. It’s equivalent to Saint Rank or Tier 7.’ Ebony realised that he wasn’t sure what the rank of Teheil’s Worldcore was as that determined the highest quality material that the planet could potentially produce. It was highly likely to be Ancient like Elcra and not any higher.
If it were any higher, the fights here wouldn’t be carried out by so few Emperors. Gearhart himself would have to make sure the planet was his if he wanted to plunder materials that high in quality. Boilers Knights were a must to take control of the place and they might not be sufficient depending on how large the world would be. The current Cinderashian forces here didn’t even have a large quantity of top Bellicose Savants to maintain their portion of Teheil.
‘Now that I think about it, Unclassed is Tier 1. Huh? Weird.’ Something felt off to Ebony but he couldn’t put his finger on it so he quickly put the thought aside.
It took over 300 million fully saturated Inferior cubes to produce a single Ancient-quality cube. And to saturate them, it was in a similar pattern. The inferior cubes needed to combine 3 of themselves to become saturated but the Common ones needed 6, the Uncommon needed 9 and so on in the pattern of 1+1+1, 2+2+2 instead of multiplying.
Taking the fact that the cube had a range where it could connect to other cubes that increase with their rarity and saturation rate, he could believe it if the one underground was the only cube of its rarity since it was just taking in inferior cubes as they form in real-time. The fun fact was that within the Uncommon cube, he had his hands on was split into smaller cubes where the freshest Inferior cubes were packed. Somehow, it compressed the lower rarity cubes when they came into contact for it to pack them in an orderly fashion.
Ebony was studying this pattern and how it utilised its mass to compress fresh mass. However, the compression did not heat the cube up. It was cool to touch, colder than a normal ice cube. It would do well as a cooling cube to chill drinks. This was opposite to what happens when he compresses his mana, to a small degree some physics logic he knew of still worked the same way. His constitution and spell of having compressed mana in his body heats his body up, it just so happens that his mana properties were rather cold to begin with and ice mana helped.
The latest cube sat on a platform he made out of metal outside the cave. Ebony placed it to stand on one of its edges and the cube always maintained whatever position it was naturally placed in. So the cube had self-stabilisation but would drop to the ground if he tried to place it in the air.
Yet, the cube somehow manages to not make a dent in the ground. It was able to tell a surface from the air, somehow. It would absorb some earth around the point of contact it had and support its position without forcing the earth to crumble.
Some of the Altarbound Kin’s miners had found the rock and were amazed that there was a new ‘Sacred Anchor’. They thought it was a miracle and that it was a sign that their society was more ‘anchored’ and would not be blown by their invaders.
Ebony didn’t understand them but this personality trait must be why they had the type of power they had. He didn’t even know when or from whom, but they knew he made this ‘anchor’. And the rumours that he was always with their Holy Maiden made the rumours about Ebony go in a positive direction.
In two weeks of study, he managed to understand how to perceive this cube and its contents. Through his gravity mana perception, he knew that his current cube was an Uncommon cube that contained 4 Uncommon cubes and was building up the Common cubes within its fifth Uncommon cube. It needed another 4 to become a fully saturated Uncommon. Then, he needed 63 more of these to make them Rare in quality.
With that knowledge, he told Xin not to wait up for the next few weeks and dove back underground to check the bigger toy. From what he could see, the Altarbound Kin did not treat her like a person but as an object of faith. He could sense Xin in...pain? She seemed to see some of the individuals as people she cared for but these people didn't or no longer talked to her normally. There was always some distance they kept. They never accepted any food she cooked for them and he found out she hadn't cooked in a long time because it reduced her 'holiness' by being too real as a creature that requires food. Ebony objectively believed that this race was nuts in a way too different for him to understand.
It didn’t take him nearly as long to get back down since he didn’t stop for meals or sleep.
Touching the cube in the darkness, he delved his senses to count the cubes being packed. It was a logistical problem and he should have more than enough processing power to count cubes.
‘Its packing structure is the same as expected but the exponential rise in numbers brings about a change in efficiency or power? Oh! The interconnecting space between the different rarities have a stacking structure that…stacks? That’s where the rise in mass comes from when it jumps up in quality, it uses conflicting forces.’
Indeed, he had the mental capacity to count. It was far easier than building up his unique skill. The cube was indeed Ancient quality and it already had 17 other Ancient quality cubes absorbed. With the last one being built, it would reach full saturated in…a long time. But once it fully saturates, the surrounding area would see a second cube being formed. And once 343 fully saturated Ancient cubes formed…a Legendary cube of pure mass would form.
According to his hypothesis backed by the lower rarity patterns.
‘What is this thread?’ Ebony found the outer surface of the cube to have a single thread of gravity mana running outside that wasn’t its net for absorbing fresh cubes.
Noticing the similarities with his new cube above ground, he got excited and used Sonic Reverberation and Quake Kick to start digging but he underestimated the pressures and compacted earth. It was no wonder the Kin stopped digging. Ebony couldn’t even go through a metre with a Quake Kick. Of course, he made sure the earth around him was stable so that he didn’t collapse the sky on himself and used directed sound magic so that his 'Quake' was no different from a drill.
They were already very deep underground, much deeper than the underground battlefield between the Tetramyths and Elva’s Empire. Ebony was neither an earth mage nor a Dwarf. The Altarbound Kin came this deep through sheer physical abilities and using their claws since even their digging equipment was worse than a Grandmaster’s claws but he had magic, weakened as it may be.
Fully saturated cubes would bring themselves close to each other, stacking themselves in the same structure they would once combine. They prepared themselves for their eventual combination. However, they left unsaturated cubes alone. It extends the reach of their net to capture fresh cubes.
‘Now I wonder what the range of the golden light of a Golden Field is. Is it all the way to a planet’s core? Whatever, I just have to dig within the range of the Golden Fields. I might have to search other Golden Fields to see if they produce the same thing.’ Ebony knew it was not a very useful endeavour, he couldn’t even lift the Ancient cube yet.
But something moved his body. Was it a sense of adventure? Was it a sense of treasure hunting in him? It was likely a bit of both and he saw no reason not to follow it.
He was an inexhaustible engine drilling away, chipping away at the earth and making sure he wasn’t breaking things he wasn’t supposed to break. And he was indeed stopped after two weeks. A sudden spike in temperature made him backtrack and call the expert at heat sensing.
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When he returned, it seemed like the propaganda was working better than they imagined. The High Priestess tilled the lands even when she wasn’t sealed in ice but Ebony never stopped taking over her body control whenever he could.
Their Altar of Might had not been relit yet.
Ebony took a day off before he brought Xin back down.
“What do you think?”
“You need to go through? There’s probably magma past a few metres.”
“How hot, can we survive?”
“I can. I doubt you can without full mana protection, you’ll be melted in your current state.” Coming down to strength, she was very perceptive. His body was far from the toughest it could be without his mana repository full. It was a small percentage full and only filled with coagulated mana.
While Xin lost all capabilities of magic augmentation, he also lost a huge amount of constitution. He was just fortunate he could run enough augmentations with coagulated mana alone.
By her estimation, the amount of magma they were dealing with wasn’t something he could freeze fast enough either.
“I see. Alright, thanks.” Ebony wasn’t disappointed that he was stopped by natural forces. Even if he did get through, he wouldn’t be able to lift the cubes away. Having come so close, he also sensed how many cubes were packed together. 340 likely fully saturated cubes sat in or past a magma pool. Since the gravitational mana didn’t turn, he didn’t dare to find a different route. It would be bad if he caused a natural disaster.
He didn’t even need to look for other Golden Fields.
Walking Xin back to train with the two Guardians, he came back down to practise gravitational manipulation to lift this impressive cube. It shouldn’t be as hard as lifting its mass for real, he just needs to make use of the cube’s gravitational strength. That should be a perfect job for a proper mage.
The 3 years that Xin stated flew by.
Although Ebony had presents for Xin, such as the 1.2 kilograms of Molten Nucleus he exchanged for his prison time, he hadn’t given it to her. He was a fair person, he estimated the price before he stole…reappropriated it from one of Gearhart’s sons who was using the glowing rock for his absorption. It was Legendary quality too.
As for how he reappropriated it, it was significantly easier than one might imagine. When the island one was standing on suddenly flew up, his clones just had to whisk the small pebble away. Invisible and unheard. The non-magic-using society didn’t account for mana theft protection.
The Molten Nucleus would be better taken out when they were back on Elcra or somewhere that didn’t absorb mana. If Teheil recognised foreign materials and thought it had to be drained dry, he would have fed Teheil a good item for free so Ebony left it in his bag within their containers. Same with the Pyrothernite Source Stone he ‘traded’ for.
The High Priestess or rather, the Altarbound Kin’s were a group of people Ebony might never come to understand. For what the High Priestess had done, and what she was put through didn’t seem to matter to dampen her feelings and mood. She was only delighted that a spark had been lit on their Altar of Might. The horned warriors immediately drew power from the Altar and the belief in their might as a species only skyrocketed once the spark had been lit.
The unhorned, seeing the power that the Altar gave their horned kins, had an even stronger belief that they were powerful, further strengthening the Altar’s spirit flame. This Altar was nothing physical, he couldn’t see it. He only knew about it because the Altarbound Kin’s talk about them all the time.
Since they didn’t need a singular symbol of might anymore, any other kin could bolster the Altar’s power with a show of might. That includes the two strongest Guardians present. With enough time and successful battles, their Altar of Might should regrow to its past glory if not exceed it. That would be very difficult for some time, there used to be billions of them so their current numbers didn’t support their Altar’s spirit flame very much.
‘This trait is a bit similar to the Tetramyth’s skill, Spirit Nexus but it doesn’t transfer stats just drawing powering from spirit instead so the buff is smaller but it’s less intensive on the user.’ How much power the Altarbound Kin could draw from the shared altar seemed to depend on a skill that the horned ones learned.
Ebony made an effort to get acquainted with a few people who nursed Xin to health when she had been injured in the past. And those who fed her. But he didn’t get close with any of them and they didn’t treat him like a human in both the good and bad way. It was worse for Xin but she was fine with it, perhaps having a superiority complex made it feel natural for her when weaker creatures show that much reverence. That or he was still poor at understanding emotions. 'we should really talk more instead of understanding each other through body language...' That reverence made Ebony uncomfortable but it was their race’s personality trait.
He never said it out loud but this race would make very good cultists. They were intense in certain ways.
Ebony freed the High Priestess for good and Xin didn’t hesitate to cut off one of the High Priestess horns. Instead of taking the horn away, she placed the horn on the head of the statue of the High Priestess. The strong warriors and priestesses present all knelt and bowed in awe at her actions.
They interpreted it as the Holy Maiden’s final blessing and statement that their race would recover to the point where 4 horned individuals would return in time. They were delusional and the biggest reason why he couldn’t seem to get along with any of them.
“Come take a seat.” Ebony patted his pet cube floating by his side. After he was done studying his Uncommon version, he stopped syphoning an area away to feed the cube. However, the new cube on the surface was already of Rare quality and was a spot for the Kin to visit and worship.
Ebony didn’t need to feed it because at this quality, it could reach pretty deep underground and find its kind. It would take longer but he was pretty sure a second cube would form deeper underground that should grow faster. When both of them became saturated Ancient cubes, he could return to saturate the one he was bringing away and see if he could combine them all.
Ebony bringing the Sacred Anchor from underground seemed to have their people even more funny ideas and ‘revelations’. They were so positive that they spun a tale where he ‘removed’ the old anchor that brought them doom instead. They were crazy.
“...You’re sure it's safe right.” Xin looked at the black rock that pulled light around their surroundings in to dim the sky. It sparkled like a starry night sky.
“Look, it’s absolutely safe.” Ebony manipulated the rock above his head and let go of his control to let it drop.
Screaming, Xin charged and tackled him across the farmlands. The cube dropped like a meteor before stopping the instant it came into contact with the ground. “ARE YOU CRAZY!”
As a man and believer of science, Ebony trusted that he understood the properties of this material. It was a metal ore. Despite his initial laugh about dying to a rock, the properties of this ore simply don’t do that. Naturally.
The cube would simply stop short of damaging what it touched, all it did was put upon a dragging force towards it on contact with anything. Since the dragging force couldn’t tear them apart, it was just a cube of metal that, once dropped on a person, wouldn’t splatter them into bloody juice. It would, however, keep dragging enough material around it to support its mass. So if Ebony were to lay under the rock, the surrounding earth would bury, compress and suffocate him to death.
Now that he could control about 15% of all the gravity mana it contained, Ebony could lift it off himself before being buried. That was also thanks to a few skills such as his Domain, more accurately his Will and his manipulation working to strengthen his control. Sadly, he hasn’t been able to override the cube’s properties so he couldn’t actively suppress this effect and dropping it on an opponent wasn’t a viable option of attack.
He had to be careful, roughly 20% of the gravity mana within the cube cannot be used no matter what. That was used to keep the structure of the cube itself stable. If he did use it, through tests on lower quality cubes, the cube would disassemble and vomit out lower quality cubes.
To lift this cube and move it, Ebony didn’t have any spare mana left. All his regeneration that was turned into coagulated mana fast enough was spent to move this cube. He also couldn’t place it in his bag since it wouldn’t budge if he did that. The contents of his bag would be destroyed by the dense cube as well.
Caressing her head, he cupped her chin and cheeks. “Looks like your intuition isn’t that sharp.”
With a bonk on his head, he lifted her who sat on the edge of the cube with her legs crossed and sped out of the Altarbound Kin’s city at record speed.
With this much gravity mana, they were moving almost as fast as he could with Phantom’s Flicker. Once his control improved or he was out of Teheil with a greater amount he could utilise and force the cube’s properties to work on his side, this cube might help move him faster than he could run.
“Wear some shoes.” Ebony thought that the Altarbound kin led her astray.
“Mine already got torn and the Kin don’t wear shoes. The ones you made will get destroyed if I move.”
“Then put on your bodysuit, we’re not exactly welcome where we’re going now.” Standing on the cube behind her he checked his direction again after going into the strong curtain of cushioning that swerved them on entry.
“Yeah yeah, stop nagging me. I can put that on at any instant. Where are we going?”
“Our best bet is the humans. The Ferroquads hate you. The Cinderashians have a high chance of recognising this prison of mine. I’m also worried I would get trapped the moment I get out of Teheil. You know what, I’m surprised the Cinderashians never took any actions against me. Mr Guru sure doesn’t want knowledge of me to spread.”
“You should have killed him, he is an actual threat.” Xin swung the top crossed leg back and forth.
“I know he’s dangerous but my gut feeling tells me that it's thanks to him that no one has started chasing me down.” Ebony hoped he managed to instil enough fear but his words were overly optimistic. It definitely wasn’t sufficient.
They would think that he only escaped because practically everyone didn’t know he as a prisoner existed, which was very true. His clones wouldn’t be able to do anything if they didn’t have the time to prepare and change the entire Gearhart estate to be able to be lifted into the air. A lot of runic prep work was done over the course of years.
“Hmm…my gut feeling says otherwise. Something else is happening.” Xin grabbed his leg when the cube shook unstably after popping out of the strong cushioning and speeding up.
‘Other reasons Gearhart isn’t coming after me, he might not have returned but he must have heard the news by now. Busy? Letting me grow? Or are they that concerned about my name, Rime…’
“Oh well, I’m not complaining.” Ebony shrugged and moved on.